Monday, August 2, 2010

In little-noticed comments, a member of the controversial JournoList e-mail group first publicly exposed in 2008 that news media reporters "threw their support" to Barack Obama, then a presidential candidate.

John B. Judis, senior editor at the New Republic and a contributing editor to the American Prospect, described in a May 2008 article for the New Republic how members of the news media openly backed Obama.

At first, reporters backed Obama's chief rival for the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton. But Clinton alienated reporters by her attacks on Obama instead of recognizing him as a "historic" candidate, conceded Judis.

Wrote Judis: "Race is the deepest and oldest and most bitter conflict in American history – the cause of our great Civil War and of the upheavals of the 1950s and '60s. And if some voters didn't appreciate the potential breakthrough that Obama's candidacy represented, many in the Democratic primaries and caucuses did – and so did the members of the media and Obama's fellow politicians."

Judis added that as Clinton "began treating Obama as just another politician, they recoiled and threw their support to him."

He wrote that Clinton's negative ads attacking Obama resulted in her losing "the opinion-making class's vote during those fateful early weeks of the primary season."

"This included her fellow politicians, who would serve as superdelegates, and the media," he wrote.

Judis quoted from an anti-Clinton editorial in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that slammed Hillary Clinton's campaign as recalling "the worst of the Clinton years; the divisiveness and the bickering; the too-casual, if artful, blend of truth and half-truth."

"I heard the same refrain from journalists and bloggers who had been either pro-Hillary or on the fence," wrote Judis.

Judis is one of 107 names confirmed to be on the JournoList e-mail group of about 400 reporters and activists. The list shut down earlier this month after group members were caught discussing how to minimize negative publicity about Obama's radical associations, such as the politician's long relationship with his pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

WND reported last week that among the individuals who were part of JournoList were activists with ties to the White House and a socialist group closely linked for years to Obama.

Other members of JournoList were activists from a far-left think tank that has partnered with ACORN and was founded with input from Obama.

The group, Demos, may have been instrumental in securing the appointment of Obama's former "green jobs" adviser, Van Jones, who resigned after it was exposed he funded a communist organization.

Among the known members of JournoList was Jared Bernstein, chief economist to Vice President Joe Biden.

Another member was a colleague of Judis, Robert Kuttner, co-founder and co-editor of the American Prospect. Kuttner is also one of five founders of the George-Soros-funded Economic Policy Institute and a distinguished senior fellow of Demos.

Demos originally recommended the Obama administration hire Van Jones, also a Demos personality.

According to Demos' own website, while Obama was a state senator in 1999, he served on the working group that founded Demos.

Months before Obama hired Jones in March 2009, Chuck Collins, an associate of Soros and a longtime leftist activist linked to socialist causes, penned a piece for Demos recommending the White House hire Jones. Collins is director of the Tax Program for Shared Prosperity at Demos.

Through a socialist party, Obama may be more closely linked to Collins.

Researcher Trevor Loudon of the New Zeal blog dug up official newspapers of the socialist-oriented New Party that list Collins as among the party's founding builders in its fall 1994 edition. Collins is listed with approximately 100 other activists in an article entitled "Who's Building the New Party?"

WND previously reported on newspaper evidence showing Obama was a member of the New Party, which sought to elect members to public office with the aim of moving the Democratic Party far leftward to ultimately form a new political party with a socialist agenda.

Also, in an exclusive e-mail interview, Marxist activist Carl Davidson, a New Party founder, recounted to WND Obama's participation with his New Party organization.

JournoList members part of socialist group

Kuttner, meanwhile, is linked to a socialist group, the Democratic Socialists of America, with which Obama also has deep ties.

Also, scores of known members of the JournoList group are linked to Democratic Socialists of America.

Kuttner himself addressed the group's November 1989 national convention in Maryland.

Loudon found that in 1990, the group was selling a list of pamphlets, including "Democratic Promise: Ideas for Turning America in a Progressive Direction," by both Kuttner and Democratic Socialists of America founder Michael Harrington.

In 1998, the group's official publication described Kuttner as a "socialist."

Kuttner helped found, with at least a dozen other members of Democratic Socialists of America, the highly influential "progressive" umbrella group Campaign for America's Future.

Among the founders of the group was Joel Rogers, a principal founder of the socialist New Party of which Obama was reportedly a member.

Three other Campaign for America's Future founders – James Galbraith, Todd Gitlin, and Michael Kazin – were members of the JournoList group.

Also part of JournoList was the publication Mother Jones, which includes on its board reported Democratic Socialists of America member Adam Hochschild.

Loudon notes the Economic Policy Institute, part of JournoList, is led by Democratic Socialists of America member Larry Mishel.

Institute members have joined the Obama administration, including William Spriggs, a senior adviser in the Department of Labor, and Rebecca Blank, undersecretary for economic affairs in the Department of Commerce.

Also, institute staffer and JournoList member Jared Bernstein is now Biden's economic adviser.

Also on JournoList was the editor of the Nation magazine, Katrina vanden Heuvel, an institute trustee who presides over an editorial board that includes Democratic Socialists of America members Norman Birnbaum, Barbara Ehrenreich and Deborah Meier.

Loudon's blog lists dozens of other Democratic Socialists of America members or affiliates who are part of the JournoList group.

Obama himself spoke at a forum organized by the group at the University of Chicago in early 1996 called "Employment and Survival in Urban America."

Quentin Young, considered the father of the U.S. single-payer movement, is a longtime Democratic Socialists of America activist. He has had a relationship with Obama, particularly in the 1990s, when he reportedly advised Obama on health care.

Young reportedly was present at a 1995 meeting at the home of former Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers, who was said to have launched Obama's political career.

Young has been active in Chicago socialist circles and was previously accused of membership in a communist group. In 1992, Chicago's branch of the Democratic Socialists of America awarded Young, a member, with their highest honor – the Debs Award.

In a 2008 article in the official Communist Party USA magazine, Young noted Obama previously expressed support of a single-payer universal health-care program, although he later waffled when asked about his position.

As an Illinois state senator representing a mostly black district on the South Side of Chicago, Obama publicly supported universal health care. He also co-sponsored the Bernardin Amendment, which did not pass but would have amended the Illinois State Constitution to add health care to the list of basic rights for residents.

Meanwhile, Obama spoke at the March 29, 1998, memorial service for Chicago Democratic Socialists of America member Saul Mendelson.

Timuel Black, a member activist, mediated political disputes on behalf of Obama in the 1990s and was reportedly involved in Obama's campaign committee during his successful 2004 Senate race.

Longtime member activist Arnold Wolf was a member of "Rabbis for Obama" and has held fundraisers in his home for Obama, including a function in 1995 that was aimed at introducing Obama to the Hyde Park activist community.

Eliseo Medina, international executive vice president of Service Employees International Union, has been honored by Democratic Socialists of America. During the most recent presidential campaign, Medina served on Obama's National Latino Advisory Council. WND reported Medina, speaking at a 2009 Washington, D.C., conference, declared granting citizenship to millions of illegal aliens would expand the progressive electorate and help ensure a progressive governing coalition for the long term.

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